How VMware’s Leadership Sees Virtualization

The morning of the first day of VMworld 2012 conference, VMware CEO Paul Maritzhis soon-to-be successor Pat Gelsinger answered open questions from the press. Here are some of their comments.

With regard to VMware’s global virtualization penetration, they’re aware that while VMware is well established in mature markets, they’ve got a lot of work to do in less mature markets.

Can VMware be ported over to ultra density ARM-based servers? Users technically have the capability to do that already. Maritz thinks that ARMs have a long way to go before you get the power of an X86 processor. It comes down to their different architectures. ARM is designed for lower power, especially when you’re not pushing cycles through. For virtualization, they’re looking for the ability to constantly manage the data center and the “always on” high level of processing.

Private cloud shift the roles of tech workers. When deploying private cloud, companies have to manage their resources differently since infrastructure is pooled rather than siloed. Since customers look for help from VMware on managing their employees, the company’s created a living project to codify best practices.

VMware will maintain its relationship with EMC, but they will still remain independent companies.

How will the company compete with Windows Server 2012? Maritz says Microsoft’s strategy for the past seven years has been to say, essentially, that its software is “good enough.” He argues that expectations for software are rapidly maturing. VMware is trying to increase automation by extending virtualization from the server up to the entire data center. While Microsoft is announcing it’s ready for server virtualization, Maritz argues the game has changed. It’s now about data center virtualization.

VMware will begin orchestrating loads based more on network and bandwidth than just compute and memory requirements.